Читать книгу A Glasgow Trilogy - George Friel - Страница 14

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CHAPTER EIGHT

Percy was the first to see the cellar had been entered. He came down by the chute on Sunday night, making his usual visit to what had become a sanctuary to him, and stopped at once when he reached the floor. He thought he was going to faint. For the first time in his life he understood what it meant to get a shock. Something seemed to have hit him in the midriff, his heart went vaulting and then tumbled, his legs were paralysed, his head was a clamour of alarm bells, his eyes were in a mist one moment and as sharp as an eagle’s the next, his palate was parched and his tongue was stuck to it, his brow felt chilled, and he nearly wet himself.

When he recovered from the seizure he galloped over to the chests, almost tripping himself on his splay feet in his excitement. His torso was so far ahead of his legs that he seemed to mean to get there by bodily extension rather than by running. He saw the concert props and costumes weren’t quite as they had been left. Some that had been in different chests were now in the same chest, some that had been underneath were now on top. He leaned over the first chest, pulled out skirts, hats, jackets, trousers, cardboard capstans and festoons of coloured paper, and delved to the bottom. The money was still there. And so with the other chests. Whoever had been in the cellar and swept it out and moved the chests hadn’t disturbed more than the top layers. The transistor, the tape-recorder and record- player, the TV and the uke and the guitar were still safe against the farthest and darkest wall of the cellar, the rats’ wall, behind a faç ade of planks, pails and the barrel of washing-soda. So much for the thoroughness of the cleaners’ cleaning. He knelt beside one of the chests with his hands clasped and said a sincere prayer of thanks.

‘Oh, blessed El, I thank thee for not allowing thyself to fall into the hands of the ungodly,’ he panted, his mouth against his finger-tips.

He thought of moving the money, but he didn’t know where else he could put it. If it had survived one attack in the cellar it could survive another. The cellar still seemed the safest place for it, and the proper place too, since it had been found in the cellar. He was unwilling to find a new site for what had always been safe in the place where it was discovered. The cellar seemed its natural and even sacred place because that was where El had chosen to reveal himself. Even the distribution amongst three chests had a mystical meaning to him. He couldn’t bear to tamper with fortune by shifting anything.

He called an extraordinary assembly at once, held a special service, and declared an extra dividend in thanksgiving for the safety of El. The Brotherhood didn’t mind the special service, they liked singing together, and they took the extra share-out gladly enough. But looking down from his throne Percy noticed signs of a strange uninterest here and there, an air of forced swallowing. There came to him suddenly the memory that he had helped the woman in charge of the dinner-school once when he was a boy, and she had given him a double helping of ice- cream after the diners were all gone. He took it eagerly. It was three or four times as large as the largest ice he had ever had before. Then she gave him a second plateful, just to be nice to him, and he got through it only because it was impossible to refuse ice-cream. But he was sick afterwards, and it made him think less of ice-cream in the future.

‘It was only the cleaners, ye know,’ Savage explained wisely after the service. ‘The way you talk you’d think it was evil spirits had raided the place.’

‘Maybe you don’t believe it, but the world’s full of evil spirits,’ said Percy.

‘Oh aye, I believe that,’ said Savage with flippant solemnity.

‘I know it was the cleaners was in,’ Percy tried again. ‘I’m perfectly well aware of that, but the point is what made them come down here. Nobody’s ever been down here before. If that wasn’t the promptings of evil spirits, what was it? Go on, you tell me! And what’s more it’s a miracle they didn’t find anything. That shows we’re being looked after. You’ve got to believe in destiny, ye know. Kismet. Kay Sarah, Sarah.’

‘It was wee Noddy was telling me his maw was in here Saturday afternoon,’ Savage answered conversationally, refusing to ask who Sarah was. He knew Percy was just dying to explain it to him. ‘He knew by the Saturday night everything was okay. His old girl never mentioned a thing. Your maw was down as well. Did she no’ tell ye? Jees, that would have had ye worried stiff if she’d said to ye, I’m going down the cellar to clean it out!’

Percy snubbed him silently. He hadn’t known his mother was in the cellar on Saturday. He had missed her in the afternoon, but he hadn’t asked where she had been and she didn’t tell him. It made his head ache to think of the danger they had been in. His headaches were becoming a daily plague, and he blamed them on the strain he was under, being responsible for the safety of thousands of pounds and the welfare of a horde of ungrateful boys. And so it would go on till something happened. Something was bound to happen. But he couldn’t imagine what it was. He lived in fear of a knock at the door. Every time he passed a policeman he felt nervous. He dreamt nearly every night of the stranger who had accosted him in Tulip Place, and waited patiently for his bad dreams to come true. The stranger must reappear. He knew there was no escape from him. He felt all alone and powerless. It came back to him that he had wanted to have a lot of money so that he could get peace. And now he had less peace than ever. He had the money, but his mind wasn’t free to write poetry. But would Shelley have written any poetry if he had to look after a street-gang? He made up his mind to start tomorrow and organize his life better, so as to find time and peace to begin writing a poem. But it was always a case of starting tomorrow. He groaned, sitting on Miss Elginbrod’s chair, and put his head between his hands, his elbows on his knees.

‘Headache?’ piped Savage brightly in a commercial TV voice. ‘Be good to yourself! Take a Scrunchy-Lunchy. Six good points for sixpence. Makes you one shade lighter. Scrunchy-Lunchy’s good for weans, puts an end to aches and pains. Take a Scrunchy-Lunchy tonight and tomorrow you’ll—’

‘Oh, shut up, you!’ Percy snarled at him, turning on his Chief Claviger, taking his hands away to reveal a frustrated face with big bewildered eyes. He hated vulgarity. It added to his distress that he was coming to hate Savage, yet once he had liked him. He had meant to polish a rough diamond, and now he hated the look of it.

Savage was delighted. He had got Percy really annoyed.

‘Aw, keep the heid,’ he said amiably, and went away.

Drunk with power at having got the better of Percy he caught up on the other members of the Brotherhood at the corner of Tulip Place and entertained them with an imitation of Frank Garson. He couldn’t stand Frank Garson, and he couldn’t leave him alone. He had always to be making a fool of him because he kept his face clean and spoke politely. His star turn was to put on a West-end voice and repeat something Garson had said. The incon- gruity of chaste correct speech coming from Savage’s loose mouth gave the Brotherhood an uneasy amusement and they laughed guiltily when he imitated a girlish walk to go with his imitation of Garson’s girlish voice.

‘It was Ai who found the money, but Ai don’t want any share, ow now, thenk you.’ Sa metter of fect, Ai think Ai ought to inform the polis.’

He picked up a phone from mid-air, dialled a number in the same place, and squeaked, writhing like a striptease dancer, ‘Ello, ello, Sat Whitehall 1212? Ken Ai hev a wurrd with the Chief Constable, pulease? Ello, ello, ello! Satchoo, Chief Ai jist want to report there’s an awful lot of boys here has an awful lot of money. Kin Ai claim a reward for telling you?’

‘Ach, wheesht,’ said Specky, past being amused. ‘You’ll make jokes about money once too often. Somebody’ll hear you.’

‘You know Percy’s rule,’ Skinny accused him. ‘And it’s a wise rule too. We promised never to mention money outside.’

‘I’m fed up wi’ him and his great god El,’ Savage retorted lightly. ‘Money’s money the world over, and ye might as well admit it. Kidding yerself it’s something mysterious and supernatural, the way Percy talks, it’s daft. Where’s wee Garson? I want to see him. Did ye notice he’s still no’ taking any money?’

They ambled on together, a little gang of them, till they caught up with Frank Garson crossing the waste land between the Steamie and the back of Bethel Street, a desolation of hard earth and dockens.

‘Oi, Garsie!’ shouted Savage, a domineering note in his voice.

Garson turned obediently and waited. He was always polite, even to people who were rude to him. Savage came close up and flipped his finger tips against the waiting boy’s nose.

‘When are you gaun tae start taking yer share o’ the lolly?’ he whispered, smiling maliciously.

It vexed him, it provoked him deeply and sharply, that Garson stuck to his position that they ought to report the finding of the money and wouldn’t take any part of it. Garson knew he would never go to the police on his own, especially when they had the money so long, but Savage didn’t know that. He was afraid Garson would turn informer and he wanted to incriminate him by forcing money on him. Being a reasonably intelligent youngster, Garson saw what Savage was up to and he had the wit to see that taking a little would make him just as guilty as taking a lot. He determined from the beginning to take nothing and he was nowhere near yielding now. He would keep his hands clean against the day of reckoning that would certainly come. But he went to the Friday Night Service every week because he enjoyed the strangeness of it in the candlelight. Percy’s sermons and the hymn singing satisfied a longing for communion with his mates. He was lonely, and he needed the Brotherhood, he was still so young.

‘Are ye feart somebody catches ye wi’ a pound note in yer pocket?’ Savage persisted against the silence facing him.

‘I just don’t want any money,’ Garson answered simply. ‘That’s all. I think you’re all making a terrible mistake. And you’ll be sorry one day. You’ll see.’

‘Then you shouldn’t be coming to the cellar at all,’ Savage argued, pushing him away. ‘You’ve no right to be coming to Percy’s Friday Night Services. That’s only for folk that believe in El, like Percy says, it’s no’ for heathens like you that believe in nothing.’

He turned and grinned to the gang that had followed him in pursuit of Garson, amused at his use of Percy’s language and wanting them to be amused too. They watched with dull faces.

‘I go to them because I want to,’ Garson said boldly. ‘I don’t have to defend myself to you. I’ve a right to go. It was I who found the money.’

‘I tellt ye, I tellt ye!’ Savage crowed triumphantly to the gang. ‘Oh boy, oh boy! It was Ai who! Oh brush my shoes, Cherlie! My maw’s a duchess!’

He flicked a finger tip against the tip of Garson’s nose and asked abruptly, ‘How is yer maw noo? Dyever see her?’

The flick in the nose angered Garson. It was surprisingly painful. It made his eyes water. In an instinctive response he hit out at Savage and missed him. Savage cackled and danced round him.

‘Haw, haw! Ye couldna hit a coo on the erse wi’ a banjo!’

Garson lunged again and missed again.

‘Haw, haw, ye hivna got a maw!’ Savage chanted the rude rhyme, and sang on malevolently, ‘Yer maw ran awa’ wi’ a darkie.’

‘She didn’t!’ Garson screamed in a frenzy. Yet it was all he had ever heard said, and his denial was an act of faith in the ultimate goodness of the universe. If he accepted common gossip as the truth then the world was bad, but the world couldn’t be bad. It was good, Percy was good. His father was good. School was good. The stories he read were good. He tried to grapple with Savage, to catch him and choke him, but he was far too slow, and he was blinded with tears of anguish. Then as he blundered and lurched this way and that way, Savage stood stock still and faced up to him.

‘Come on and I’ll fight you then,’ he said, suddenly grim and blood-thirsty.

The Brotherhood formed a ring with a rapid manoeuvre worthy of well-trained troopers, and the surplus members climbed on to the top of the pre-nuclear-age air-raid shelters to watch the fight from there and cheer the winner from a ringside seat.

Garson blinked, trying to see his enemy clearly through tears that reflected a cruel world. He had a brief intuition that the people were evil after all, and if that was how it was there was no use fighting. He was beaten before he started. He was no fighter anyway. He was smaller, sligh- ter, far less of a brawler by build and temperament than Savage. But he had to fight even though it was useless. He would die honourably. He shaped up clumsily, nervously, and while he was still making up his mind whether to lead with the left hand or the right Savage punched him right on the nose with one hand and then bang on the eye with the other.

Garson yelped and wept, and Savage hit him in the stomach. He put his hands there to console the shock and Savage smacked him on the ear. In a few seconds he was a quivering helpless morsel of inadequate boyhood. Blood came down his nose over his lips and he was squeamish at the salty taste of it, the water brimming over his eyes kept him from seeing right, and the bells ringing in his ear made him lose all sense of balance and direction. He stumbled and flailed. Still he wouldn’t give in. He wouldn’t turn and run. He didn’t know where to run to. He kept on trying to fight, but he had no idea of fighting. Savage was radiant with the lust of punishment. He had no mercy. He was a wily battering ram, and Garson was the young lamb bleating at the slaughter.

Skinny filtered silently through the rowdy mob as soon as he saw it was a case of murder, and ran for Percy. He found him with his big feet in Tulip Place and his head in the clouds. He was thinking about the stranger. He was always thinking about the stranger. But now he was beginning to feel safe again, it was so long since he had seen him. He was rather proud of his plan for making sure nobody entered or left the cellar if there was anyone odd hanging about the corner: one of the Brotherhood stayed outside at every service and if he saw any stranger he was to play in Tulip Place and keep kicking a ball against the cellar door as if he was practising shooting and collecting rebounds. That was the warning. A simple signal that no stranger could recognize for what it was, Percy was sure. So far there had been no need for the sentry to kick a ball against the door. Perhaps the stranger had gone away for good. Perhaps he was in jail. He looked a real jail-type. Whatever he was he didn’t seem to be a danger any longer.

Last to leave the cellar, the dreaming lord of uncounted wealth, Percy paid off the sentry and ambled down Tulip Place in grim meditation, welcoming the headache it gave him as the price he had to pay for being a thinker. It was all very well looking after a crowd of ungrateful schoolboys, but it was time he did something for himself too. He had his career to think of. All this time gone and he hadn’t even got around to finishing that Ode to Speed he had started.

‘Savage is killing Garson!’ Skinny yelled, grabbing the Regent by one gaunt wrist and shaking it madly.

‘Whit are ye talking aboot noo?’ Percy grumbled crossly. He left the island in the Mediterranean where he had a patio or hacienda or something like that, he wasn’t sure which, but he had in mind a big house with a verandah, and came unwillingly back to Tulip Place.

‘He’s fighting him and Garson canny fight,’ Skinny explained in a hurry. ‘It’s blue murder so it is. Come on and stop it, Percy! Please! Afore he kills him. Ye ought to see the state he’s in, it’s terrible!’

‘Whit way could you no’ stop it?’ Percy demanded, forced to trot as Skinny, still clutching his wrist, turned and raced across the street, through a close, across the back-court, and over to the waste land beside the Steamie. ‘Or Specky? Fat lot o’ use there was making yous somebody. You never use the authority I gave you. How would it be if I just let yous all do whit ye like? Tell me that.’

He grumbled all the way, but Skinny said nothing. He let Percy grumble. He saw no point answering such daft questions. How could he ever stop Savage hitting anybody he wanted to hit? There were things you just had to give in to and put up with, like the brute force of Savage. He had taken a big enough risk running away to fetch Percy. He could only hope that in the excitement nobody would notice it was he who brought Percy along and that he would be safe from the later vengeance of Savage for spoiling him of his prey.

The Brotherhood opened to let Percy get into the ring and he splay-footed indignantly over to Savage, who was kicking Garson in the ribs as the boy cowered on the ground with his head in his arms and his shoulders shaking with sobs. Percy hit Savage an open-handed smack across the face, so hard that the sound was clearly heard by the spectators on top of the air-raid shelters, and they gasped an ‘Oo-oo-oo!’ of mingled delight and alarm at the violence of the blow.

‘You chuck that!’ Percy shouted angrily. ‘Or I’ll give you a kicking, so I will. You’re nothing but a big bully. You think you can settle everything by force. Whatever you’re fighting about fighting proves nothing. I’ve tellt ye that before. Can ye no’ take a telling?’

He glared down at Savage, heaving with temper, and Savage rubbed his cheek and grinned up at him amiably. He wasn’t bothered. His lust was satisfied. A smack on the face was a small price to pay for leaving Garson a bloody weeping humiliated victim on the ground. His father had hit him harder often for nothing.

Percy shook him at the throat, almost lifting him off the ground, and Savage wriggled and wrenched himself away.

‘It was nothing,’ he said innocently. ‘Keep the heid, Percy. The wee fella wanted to have a square go so I gave him wan and he couldny take it, that was a’. You don’t need to start shouting the odds aboot it.’

Garson got on his knees, then on his feet, and brushed himself with trembling hands, little soft white hands that couldn’t have punched a bus-ticket. His lower lip was going as if he had a permanent stammer and he was still crying.

Percy wanted to comfort him, to stand up for him, to avenge him. His brain was in a mist of pity. But he had sworn never to have favourites in the Brotherhood because that would only cause strife and jealousy. He swallowed his loving anguish for the unfriended boy till the bitterness of it made him grue. Then he spoke out harshly, shaking Garson as he had shaken Savage.

‘What do you want to go starting fights for? You know damn fine you’re no’ a match for Sheuchie Savage, ye wee fool!’

Garson suffered the shaking patiently as long as it lasted, and the moment he was released he turned and went away. The mob opened an alley for him and let him pass along without a whisper of sympathy or a hand raised to console him with a pat on the back, and he went off shaking his head as if Percy’s large hand was still at his collar.

‘Ye’re a horde of ruffians!’ Percy cried in exasperation, feeling he had let Garson down but not knowing what else he could have done.

‘Yous that was watching and made no attempt to stop it, yous are just as bad as Savage, only worse. We’ve got all this – all this—’

He paused and the Adam’s apple in his scraggy neck moved up and down, but it was a crisis to him and he had to say it.

‘All this money. Aye, all this money. Yous know damn well what I mean. We’ve got all this money and yous canny live in peace. I give yous up! Come on, get away home all of yous! Scram! Come on, run, run, run! Every one of yous, beat it!’

Normally the false plural slipped from him only now and again. He had learned it was wrong, and he was trying hard to stop using it. But he was too angry to think of his grammar.

He waved his gang away with open hands like a farmer’s wife shooing hens, and those on the ground dispersed slowly, resenting his command to run, and those on the roof of the air-raid shelters jumped down and mixed guiltily with their brethren. In a few moments Percy was all alone in the waste land.

‘Hate!’ he muttered unhappily. ‘It’s only brought hate. Those two hate each other. It could have made them so happy if they would only be reasonable. I should have made them make it up before wee Frankie went away. I should have made them shake hands and be friends. It’s an awful job, making yourself responsible for folks that hasn’t been brought up to what’s right.’

A Glasgow Trilogy

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